The Cloven Land Trilogy

by Simon Kewin

  “Forgive me, Bordun. This is no ordinary child. She is Ilminion's daughter and we have to reach her before Menhroth does. She is important to the necromancy. To the rites Ilminion used. We have to take her to safety, far from the King.”

  The surprise on Bordun's face was clear. The riders were normally so inexpressive, so reserved, but Bordun was too tired, too angry. It was clear, also, he had no idea about the girl.

  “You intend to take her to Andar?”

  “Yes.”

  “She won't be any safer there.”

  For a moment she thought about revealing their plans for the flood. But no. The fewer who knew the better. She wished she could tell him what they intended, give him that thin thread of hope. But she couldn't afford to. “She may be. For a time at least.”

  “And where is this child?”

  When she gave him the name of the place Thaniel had described, Bordun looked thoughtful for a moment. All the riders had memorized maps of the wyrm roads. The archways were dotted across Angere, hundreds and hundreds of them, and only the riders knew which connected with which. Not even the King, it was said, was granted that knowledge. The roads were never drawn onto parchment, except she'd heard there were charts at Caer D'nar, the dragon riders' tower in the north. Maps used to teach each generation of rider how the wyrm roads criss-crossing Angere connected.

  “It will be dangerous,” he said at last. “We will need to make three separate jumps, and one of the connections will take us through Fiveways, which is sure to be heavily guarded.”

  “So we will be attacked? The journey is impossible?”

  “It's not impossible. Just difficult. The archways are close together but a skilled rider would be able to fly between them at great speed, angle his flight so that he was aligned on the next arch as he emerged from the last.”

  “And are you skilled enough for such riding?”

  “We shall have to see, won't we? Tell me, have you ever ridden a dragon before?”

  She couldn't resist teasing him just a little as she replied. Dragonriders could be so self-important. “I've ridden on donkeys from time to time. Is it very different?”

  She regretted her words the moment they took flight. Whether Bordun threw them around to punish her, or whether such flight was perfectly normal, she had no idea. She spent most of her time simply trying to cling on. She sat in front of Bordun, and more than once the rider had to grasp hold of her to keep her in place on the dragon's back.

  At least the enervating sense of despair had faded now she was riding the wyrm. Whether the creature had accepted her presence in some way, or whether riders were never afflicted by their dragon's aura once they were mounted she also had no way of knowing.

  Banking and twisting at speed, they passed through the Wyrmfell archway. They emerged over woods and rolling hills that she didn't recognize. Bordun had shown her how to hook her feet beneath the scales on the dragon's flanks, and at times it seemed she was only holding on with the tips of her toes. They swooped over rises in the ground, and sometimes she wasn't so much riding the dragon as falling through the air beside it. The cold air streaming into her face made her eyes water and her cheeks burn. Her hair lashed around her head despite the long pins she'd slid in to keep it in place.

  Slowly, though, she began to relax. And even enjoy herself. The dragon's back was much more comfortable than she'd imagined. She'd eyed the beast's spiky hide with some trepidation, but the scales at the base of its neck were smooth and even slightly yielding. She began to get a feel for flying. She had to lean with the dragon, flow with it rather than panic at each twist and turn. How fine it must be, she thought, to have the trust and understanding of such a magnificent beast. A part of her envied Bordun.

  The rider pointed at something up ahead. They were thundering along a winding valley between tree-lined hills. Meg peered forwards. Another of the stone archways stood in the distance. Would the wyrm road open with her there? Bordun obviously thought so. More than once she'd quietly tried stepping through one, hoping it would work for her. It never had. They opened only for the dragons and their riders.

  “Be ready,” Bordun shouted. “We'll fly through three more archways in rapid succession. We may be attacked and we'll have to cut some very tight turns. If you black out I will try and catch you, stop you from falling.”

  “Well, that's reassuring. I…”

  But her voice was ripped from her mouth by the wind as the dragon dived. The forest rushed up to meet them, suddenly so close that they were brushing the tops of the trees. The stone archways were vast when you stood beneath them, but the one up ahead looked impossibly tiny. They sped faster and faster, the dragon's great wings hurling them forwards with each beat.

  Bordun angled to one side of the archway, aiming almost at the stone pillar. When they were nearly there, the dragon pitched sharply to the side, one wing tip pointing down, one to the sky. Meg couldn't help herself screaming as she slipped from the dragon's back. Only Bordun's grasp on her tunic held her.

  The stones of the archway flashed by her head and instantly the light and air changed. Icy cold gripped her, and there were rocks, the craggy sides of mountains, all around. For a moment she couldn't work out which way was up and which way was forwards or quite who she was. They were still canted right over, the ground so close that the dragon's outstretched wing-tip would surely touch and bring them cartwheeling to the earth. There were cries and roars from somewhere, and a hot burst of flame, and then another archway flashed by. Suddenly the air became warmer again, the light brighter. The dragon banked sharply in the opposite direction, the wind sucking the breath from Meg's mouth as she tried to scream again. Another archway engulfed them, and another. At last they levelled out and the dragon began to climb, huge muscles bunching and straining to haul them skywards.

  Another arch lay ahead, this one spanning the col between two jagged, snow-covered peaks. It seemed impossible they could climb quickly enough to reach it. They were flying more or less directly at the sides of the mountain, the wyrm desperately trying to angle upwards. The rock was a blur beneath Meg's feet. Oddly, rather than panic, a strange sense of calm came over her. Even as the rock face raced nearer and nearer, it occurred to her she was glad to have experienced dragon flight before she died. Life still brought wonders even when you were as old as she was. At least the end would be quick.

  Then the dragon roared flame and with one titanic effort hurled itself towards the archway. Its wings scraped the stone floor of the col, nearly pitching Meg and Bordun off. But then they were through. Warmer air engulfed them and they glided over grassland, wooded valley slopes on either side once more.

  They circled slowly a few times, seemingly in no hurry, then thumped to the soft ground. Bordun slid from the dragon's back and held up a hand to help her down.

  “There,” said Meg. “Like riding a donkey, just as I said.”

  For a moment she thought he was going to laugh. But he stopped himself. “We are here. The far west of Angere.”

  The anger in him was still plain to see, despite his mind being closed to her. But she understood it wasn't directed at her. It went further than that. He was angry at himself, angry at what the King had done, angry at everything that had happened. She could hardly blame him. The riders were the people's heroes and protectors. Fearless, never defeated, they were sworn to defend the land and everyone in it. And what would it do to them when all that was torn in two? How wide would their wounds be? She felt sorry for him. A bitterness like that could eat you up from the inside, drain the light from your life.

  “I may have lost count,” she said, “but by my reckoning we flew through at least four archways after the Wyrmfell one.”

  “Five. I had to improvise, change the route. We were being pursued.”

  “We were?”

  “Don't worry. I was able to leave them behind. They won't know where we've come. Or at least, they'll think we've travelled elsewhere before they try here. But we've come much
farther west than I intended. We'll have to fly some distance over land to reach the palace.”

  “How far?”

  “If we fly non-stop, three days.”

  “Three days?”

  Bordun showed no emotion as he replied. “The nearer archway was too well guarded. There was nothing I could do.”

  It was cutting things very fine. Three days there and three days back meant they'd only have one day to rescue the child from the clutches of Ilminion's minions. She just had to hope that was enough time.

  “That last archway. When we had to climb so steeply. Were you sure we could make it?”

  Bordun looked pensive for a moment. “I thought we had a good chance.”

  Meg nodded, and reached out to touch his arm. “Then I thank you, Bordun. That … that really was quite wonderful.”

  She walked round to stand in front of the dragon's head. “And my thanks to you too,” she said. As she had with Hyrn, she bowed her head.

  Bordun busied himself walking along the dragon's flanks, inspecting the creature for signs of damage. Several black scorch marks that hadn't been there before marked the creature's sides. How close had their pursuit been? She'd been too confused, too overwhelmed to properly sense what was going on around her. A pretty useless dragonrider she'd make.

  She looked back at the archway they'd emerged from, a quarter mile or so up the valley, its carved stones shining in the sun. No sign of pursuit. Raucous crowds of rooks flocked in the trees up the valley sides, but other than that all was silent. Down the valley stood a ring of standing stones. The scale was hard to make out but they had to be large, each of them taller than any person. She'd never seen their like before.

  “What are they?” she asked. “Another of the ancients' wyrm roads?”

  “None that we've ever been able to use,” said Bordun. The sagas say the ancients used circles like that to travel to other worlds.”

  As a girl she'd heard plenty of stories of the other worlds. Wonderful tales, but she'd always had trouble believing them, in truth. Did such lands really even exist? Most of the stories were surely little more than fairytale nonsense.

  “The roads across the aether are closed now?” she asked.

  Bordun came back to stand beside her. “So it seems.”

  “Perhaps that is for the best, now that Menhroth has become what he has.”

  “Yes.”

  “We should move away, in case pursuit does come.”

  “Yes.”

  With a practised movement, Bordun flipped himself back onto the dragon. “We'll fly low and slow, keep to the valleys. That way we may not be seen. Are you up to it?”

  She gave him the withering look she kept for those who dared patronise her. “I can manage it if you can.”

  This time their flight was gentler. They glided most of the time, the dragon only occasionally beating its wings to gain them some height. Rooks scattered in alarm at their passing as their wide shadow darkened the tree-tops. They flew with the light, landing only when the sun set, or to replenish their supplies of water, or when Meg's bladder demanded a stop. They saw no one else, either in the sky or upon the ground, save for the distant glimpse of some palace or tower among the hills. The far west of Angere appeared to be largely uninhabited.

  They talked little, even at night as they sat together around a low fire. Bordun was lost in his own thoughts, and Meg left him in peace. On the second evening though, thinking about her own two children, she asked him if he had a family.

  His reply was terse. “Betrothed.”

  “And she or he is a rider too?” That was, Meg knew, the normal way of things among the wyrm lords.

  In reply, Bordun only nodded and wouldn't look at her. She thought she understood something about him then. Bordun's betrothed was on the other side, loyal to the reborn Menhroth. Another wound. She wished there was something she could do for him, something she could say to help. She was only grateful that her own two children, Selene and Arne, were already across the bridge. Their desire to travel, go off and see the world, had often been a secret source of sadness to her. Now she was glad of it.

  Late on the third day they landed in the flat of another valley. The sun was directly overhead, scorching in the lifeless air. The dragon drooped its neck and drank hungrily from the little rill that babbled through the valley, and Meg and Bordun did the same.

  “Ilminion's palace should be over that ridge,” said Bordun, indicating the slope with a nod of his head. “Best we creep to the top and peek over rather than announcing our arrival on dragon back.”

  “Very well.” In truth she'd be glad to feel the ground beneath her feet once more.

  Bordun led them up through the woods, crossing backwards and forwards across the slope to make the climb less steep. She wondered if he was doing that because he could discern paths through the undergrowth, or if he was just making the climb less arduous for her. She had to stop again and again, pretending to admire the view while fetching the breath back into her body. Bordun, by contrast, was utterly untroubled by the climb. When she paused, he raced ahead to scout out the land. The dragon was a dot in the far distance, soaring on upcurrents, indistinguishable from raven or buzzard to the casual glance.

  She was setting out on the final push to the top of the hill when Bordun returned to her, sliding down the hillside in his sure-footed, cat-like manner. Despite the swirling tattoos on his face she could see he was troubled.

  “What is it?” she asked. “What's happened?”

  “We're too late,” he said. “The palace. Menhroth is already here.”

  A minute or two later, they lay side-by-side at the crown of the hill, peering down on Ilminion's palace. Bordun was right. Three dragons were there, circling around the spires, occasionally unleashing their fire.

  “You're sure they're the King's?” asked Meg.

  “I'm sure. I know them.”

  Meg closed her eyes and reached out with her mind to discover how many defended the palace. And whether the baby still lived.

  She found … nothing. Puzzled, she tried again, reaching into the deepest recesses of the palace, through the thickest walls. Still there was nothing, save for a single glow. A thin, dim light deep underground. Gently she touched it with her own mind. A child. A baby. Weyerd, Ilminion's daughter, alive and well. But where were the defenders, the protectors? Who were Menhroth's wyrm lords fighting?

  She watched as a swooping wyrm unleashed an arc of flame towards one of the towers, picking out a figure hiding up there. Flames engulfed the defender, turning them into a raging torch. Meg expected them to plummet to the ground. Instead the figure stood unmoving and then, when the banking dragon was at its nearest point, leapt into the air. Trailing fire like a shooting star it jumped the impossible distance and crashed into the dragon, grasping hold of one of the beast's wings near the joint.

  The rider reacted by diving for the ground but the flaming figure, seemingly untroubled by the fire, began to flail at the rider. Unprepared, sword not drawn, the rider tried desperately to defend himself and his dragon. The dragon's head lashed around but it couldn't reach back far enough to come to the rider's assistance. The flaming undain fought its way onto the dragon's back and seized the rider in a deadly embrace, turning them both to flame.

  In a few moments it was over. Two burning figures plunged to the ground. The riderless dragon roared its rage but could do nothing.

  Watching, Meg caught an echo of the rider's agonies. They cut out as the rider died. On the ground, one figure stood. The defender, still no more than a raging shape of fire. How was it still alive? Thaniel had said these undain were barely human. He hadn't been exaggerating. The creature had been given demonic powers. And how many people had died to buy them? The horror of it made her insides lurch.

  The burning undain finally succumbed, collapsing besides the slain rider. Why hadn't she been able to sense the creature with her mind's eye? She had to know if there were others in the palace.

&
nbsp; Closing her eyes, Meg reached out into the aether again.

  This time she caught an echo of one of them. A patch of deeper darkness in the shadows. A void, an emptiness where there should have been light. She should, she thought, write that down. Perhaps, one day, it would be useful to some as-yet unborn witch who would have to face the nightmares Menhroth and Ilminion had created. As she became better at finding them she began to see others. Three of them moved within the walls of the palace. One was on the battlements and one near the gates, but the third was deep underground, seemingly near Weyerd.

  So these were the undain. These abominations, unliving but fuelled by the life stolen from others. This was what Menhroth had become. She shuddered to think about the victims Dervil had described at the King's ascension. All those women and men expended, spent. And what powers did the King yield now? What miracles could he perform if this lesser experiment of Ilminion's could do what they'd just witnessed?

  “We should wait,” said Bordun, his voice quiet beside her. “The riders won't make the same mistake again, but they will retaliate.”

  “Well they'll need to hurry up about it,” said Meg. “Time is short. We must begin the return journey tonight. First thing tomorrow at the very latest.”

  The confusion on Bordun's face was clear. “Why? We're losing this war, clearly, but what difference will another day or two make?”

  She wanted to tell him. But she held her tongue. The fewer who knew, the more chance the witches heading north had of making it to the ice. “You'll have to trust me, that's all.”

  He looked like he was going to challenge her, demand to be told why. Instead he turned away to the battle for Ilminion's palace.

  The three dragons, one of them riderless, still soared around the palace, but at a greater distance now, their wariness clear.

  “What will they do?” asked Meg.

  “Land, perhaps. Attack on foot as well as from the air. Even those horrors won't survive being cloven in half by a serpentine blade.”